1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed in general to data processing systems. In one aspect, the present invention relates to interrupt management in a data processing system that employs more than one partition.
2. Description of the Related Art
In data processing systems, the physical or hardware resources may be divided into resource subsets or logical partitions which virtually operate as a separate computer, where each partition typically contains a processor core and other specified resources or specified portions of a resource such as memory within the system. To manage interrupt processing with existing data processing systems, interrupt controllers include interrupt blocking mechanisms that control interrupt priority blocking based solely on interrupt priority on a per-processor core basis, but this approach creates significant performance issues with partitioned/virtualized machines due to interrupt controller access times and the lack of partition-based blocking. Accordingly, a need exists for an improved system and methodology for managing interrupts in a partitioned data processing system that address various problems in the art where various limitations and disadvantages of conventional solutions and technologies will become apparent to one of skill in the art after reviewing the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings and detailed description which follow, though it should be understood that this description of the related art section is not intended to serve as an admission that the described subject matter is prior art.